We have another birthday to celebrate this week. Granddaughter Destiny turns seven today. I know I used this picture just a few days ago, but it’s my favorite one of her. I just love that expression on her face. She’s always coming up with something to say that blows me away.
Several people have asked how we like our new memory foam mattress. Based upon our first night on it, we love it so far. Yesterday morning was the first time I did not wake up with back pain in as long as I can remember. Usually, Terry is awakened by tingling in her hands or sore shoulders, but yesterday she had neither. Someone asked if there was any odor with the bed. When we first unrolled it we could smell the foam or something, but by bedtime it had pretty much disappeared.
Speaking of our new mattress, I am convinced that sometimes the internet makes people crazy. After reading yesterday’s blog about the new mattress, a regular blog reader sent me a message on Facebook suggesting we should have gotten a Sleep Number air bed instead. I replied, telling her we had one and hated it, and it was like I called her grandbaby ugly or something. She went off on me, saying that obviously we had no idea how to properly inflate a Sleep Number bed to adjust it for our body weight, and added that if I lost 100 pounds I might have found it more comfortable. She finished by saying “Don’t blame the bed because of your shortcomings!” Huh? What’s that all about?
The snowbirds are flocking out of Arizona to start their summer adventure, and I have had several write me asking for directions for the bypass around El Paso, Texas that I wrote about last year. It’s an easy trip and avoids most, but not all, El Paso traffic. Though it sounds complicated, these roads all run into each other and are very easily negotiated. From Interstate 10 in New Mexico, take exit 162 and then take State Route 4Loop 375 and take it to US 18004 east 7 miles to State Route 213. Turn south on SR 213 and in about 2 1/2 miles it will cross into Texas and become FM 3255. Continue south 5 or 6 miles and you’ll join US 54 south. From there, get on Loop 375, which goes through Fort Bliss (all freeway) to US 180 (about 87 miles). Then take SR 54 south 55 miles to Van Horn and get on I-10 there. US 180 and SR 54 to Van Horn are good two lane roads, we have been over them many times in our bus and in our motorhome. The total route is about 173 miles from the time you exit I-10 in New Mexico until you rejoin it at Van Horn. By comparison, staying on I-10 straight through El Paso all the way will save you about 30 miles. To us it’s worth every bit of that. Be sure to have enough fuel onboard because once you leave El Paso there are not many places to stop, if any, before you get to Van Horn.
Do you have a set of those tire covers that are supposed to protect your RV’s tires from the sun’s ultraviolet rays, or are you considering purchasing a set? My friend Roger Marble, who spent 40 years working in the tire industry, has some interesting observations on them in his RV Tire Safety blog.
Have you entered our latest Free Drawing yet? This week’s prize is an audiobook of Big Lake Lynching
And for an interesting look at life from a computer tech’s point of view, check out Horror Stories From A Computer Tech. It’s free today and tomorrow on Amazon and includes seven true stories about the craziest, creepiest, and funniest customers an in-home computer technician encountered on the job.
Thought For The Day – You are about to exceed the limits of my medication.
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Nick Russell
World-Famous, New York Times Best Selling Author, and All-Around Nice Guy!
I have slept on the ground for weeks while in Scouting at Philmont Scout Ranch in Cimarron NM and other camps. A rack of canvas strung across a frame, in the USCG on board ship and cots on land. I have been in my RV with a foam mattress. I have spent way too much money on beds that have broken down over the years. All this of course after I was in my mothers womb. . But I have always put my head on the pillow and in 5 minutes I was asleep. Dead to the world in each situation.
To each their own on the bed choice. What ever it may be,.one thing is for sure I am glad that I am not next to your blogger!
Onward and Upward
We agree with your assessment of the Sleep Number bed. Had one and were happy to trade it for a memory foam mattress. We both sleep much better now.
As for the route around El Paso, it seems like your highway numbers got garbled. Take another look. I can send it to you again if you wish, but I know you know the way!
Glad that the mattress worked well for you….everybody is different and has different needs. To the person that ranted at you and your “shortcomings” I only have the suggestion that she get her money back from the charm school she attended.
I was told that waking with shoulder pain meant I needed a higher, thicker pillow to keep weight off my shoulders. I spent the money on a My Pillow (I think it was a green tag one, but they will help you get the right one if you mention shoulder pain) and it’s the greatest thing ever! You can get them online, but I got mine at an upscale flea market in Fredricksburg, TX. You have to wash and dry it every so often to keep it like new, but I highly recommend it for Miss Terry!
Nick,
Do you remember the old Art Linkletter show. “Kids Say the Darndest Things?” You could change a word or two and have the title to your next best selling book. It wouldn’t take long to write. Just cut and paste from your blog the outrageous, asinine things people have said to you over the years.
I’ve been looking for a new mattress too Nick … I think Sleep Number just went to the bottom of the list!!! Nothing like a little bad publicity!!! I am curious about yours however .. does it make you kind of light headed or dizzy when you lay down??? The old memory foam used to bother me … hoping the new ones are better.
Not at all Nancy. I had heard that about the older ones too, but we have not experienced it. And again this morning, we both woke up without any pain. For me that is a real blessing, because I can’t remember when pain wasn’t my alarm clock.
We have had two rigs with Sleep Number mattresses, and I hated them both. I put a memory foam topper over them, and now I sleep very well. I have known lots of people who absolutely love Sleep Numbers, though. I think you either love or hate them, and you won’t know which one you are until you have one.
I also hate sleep number beds – good thing I didn’t get the priviledge you did everybody is different. I sleep better on an air mattress but my husband doesn’t. Think I will try Sam’s club. Keep on being you.
Oh dear…we just got a sleep number…last night the first night on it. We knew we might need to get a memory foam topper eventually…but trying it this way for now. We are not strong enough anymore, with all the arthritis in our old and new injuries…so had to get something we can move ourselves…so not much choice for us. I hope it will work out.
That woman who wrote so nasty to you…hope there is a way to block her remarking to you anymore. So many thin people think they are closer to GOD being thin…hmmm, seems the HOLY Book has a lot to say about what is inside a person coming out eh?? I have seen however that time is the great equalizer. My “thin, making jokes of fat people, sister-in-law” now appears to have a bigger butt than me, honey…and her thighs looked just as big…if not bigger…heh…ah isn’t it grand?? By the way, NO MORE FAT jokes…heh, not a one. I had to laugh when I looked on her Pinterest page…nearly all of the photos are of decadent desserts…and she supposedly wants to eat healthy and loose weight!! A disconnect there. Heehee…